Happy New Year 2017!
Past greetings
(2011,
2015)
have prominently featured cycling.
Not this year.
(Which is not to say that you won't come across a bicycle or two.)
Past greetings
(2011,
2013)
have doggedly stuck to one photo per month.
Not this year.
This year's greeting offers a series of photographs that simply resonated for one reason or another.
When I'm not shooting bike racing, I tend not to feature people as subjects.
That said, that's a tendency, not a rule.
Bonus points to anyone who emails me with the correct number of people explicitly visible in the photos below (respectively naming the pictures in which they appear).
Enjoy!
[all shots taken with Sony a6000 and 50mm lens (effective 75mm) | click any image to enlarge | click
here for slideshow]
March
My friend Ellen Freeman Roth tasked me with a Facebook photo challenge--one picture per day for seven days.
Since I don't post to Facebook, I substituted Google Plus, pretty much guaranteeing that my efforts never saw the light of day.
(If a tree falls in Google Plus, does it make any noise?)
Over the span of seven days in March, I snapped and sorted and selected (all candidates
here;
final seven here).
I took the shot at right in Newton Lower Falls (MA).
[ f/1.8 | 1/500 | ISO 100 ]
|
|
|
March
At left is the second of two shots I'll share from the EFR photo challenge--this one's in Weston VT.
I like this one for its ambiguity of scale.
Are those small reeds sticking up through shallow ice?
Or large tree stumps showing through a frozen marsh?
[ f/1.8 | 1/4000 | ISO 100 ]
|
|
May
Later in May, Betsy and I headed out to Harvard (the town, not the liberal arts vendor just up the street) to spectate and photograph the
Ken Harrod Road Race
(p/b Minuteman Road Club).
Competitors in a wide range of men's and women's fields took their turns at the starting line astride racing machines of various makes, models, and colors.
The immaculate, sophisticated, and decidedly not speedy Sillgey at left kept watch.
[ f/2 | 1/4000 | ISO 100 ]
|
June
Okay, so this is the third post in a row that (kinda sorta) is about cycling.
But only obliquely.
I'd never ridden the VT 6-Gap ride (one popular sequence is Lincoln, App, Roxbury, Rochester, Brandon, Middlebury).
The June Moe's Early Morning Crew 6-Gap (MEMC6G) seemed like a good time to give it a try.
For reasons
that I won't get into here, I notched (ha!) two gaps before calling it a day.
The day before, I had some time to snap a few pics including this one at right.
Did the tombstones presage the outcome of my 6-Gap dream?
[ f/1.8 | 1/4000 | ISO 100 ]
|
|
|
June
No cycling here.
Just hiking.
Betsy and I trekked with my sister and her family up to the
Bromley summit from the west.
Only a moderately strenuous hike, but notable for its intersection at the top with the Appalachian and Long Trails, as indicated on the hard-to-miss phonebooth-sized marker at left.
[ f/5.6 | 1/125 | ISO 100 ]
|
July
Saturday.
In the park.
I think it was the Fourth of July.
Okay, so the Fourth was a Tuesday this year.
And there wasn't a park.
But it was definitely the Fourth of July.
In the form of the Chebeague Island Fourth of July parade.
This particular hubcap graced the wheel of a vintage automobile leading the celebration.
[ f/1.8 | 1/3200 | ISO 100 ]
|
|
|
July
Back on Chebeague several weeks later.
And yes, another bicycle.
Not mine, though, and not being ridden, so pretty sure that makes it art.
This particular one's sitting on the
dock of the bay (well, not exactly the bay, but definitely a dock).
Excellent morning light is the photographer's friend.
[ f/1.8 | 1/640 | ISO 100 ]
|
July
Afternoon light isn't bad either.
The coast line this time's a bit farther south in Maine--specifically
Fortunes Rocks.
[ f/1.8 | 1/3200 | ISO 100 ]
|
|
|
July
The Fortunes Rocks rocks aren't all of the large variety.
Pretty sure there's some pretty good skipping material somewhere in this shot.
[ f/1.8 | 1/2500 | ISO 100 ]
|
July
One more Fortunes Rocks shot before the next day's overcast and rain.
First pic in the series that finds a small bit of one color (green in this case) in contrast with the general color (brown) of most of the image.
I hadn't really thought of it before, but pictures with this character particularly catch my eye.
[ f/2.5 | 1/200 | ISO 100 ]
|
|
|
July
Fortunes Rocks the next morning.
Overcast.
And not much color.
But geometric.
And I like geometric too.
[ f/1.8 | 1/1600 | ISO 100 ]
|
July
Back to contrasting color.
(And add some rain.)
Not just the flowers in the foreground, but the flag in the back.
Taken just north of Fortunes Rock in Biddeford Pool.
Who names these places in
Maine?
[ f/6.3 | 1/400 | ISO 100 ]
|
|
|
July
I know you were wondering when you'd see some bicycles again.
Like the prior bikes in this year's greeting, these aren't mine either (perhaps the sizes gave that away).
But unlike the prior bikes, these are racing machines (at
Adams Farm in Walpole).
Won't be too many years before the young men or women who own these striders are showing me their tail lights.
[ f/1.8 | 1/1600 | ISO 500 ]
|
August
Mid-station of the Mad River Glen single chair.
This one's heading down.
Betsy and I had intended to hike the summit the day before the
Vermont Overland,
but we had BBQ pickup duty and didn't want to let the Dan Goldman 6-Gappers down.
The clock prevailed two-thirds of the way up (and our legs thanked us for that fact).
[ f/4.5 | 1/1000 | ISO 500 ]
|
|
|
August
Warren at the home of the aforementioned Mr. Goldman.
Something of a cliched photographer self-portrait.
I like it anyway.
Note the bull (anatomically correct--sadly, that doesn't come through in the photo) staring out between the camera strap.
[ f/3.2 | 1/50 | ISO 3200 ]
|
September
Betsy and I headed out west for
Rebecca's Private Idaho.
We started with a weekend in Ketchum (thank you, hosts Steve Mitchell and Louisa Moats!)
for the ride itself and a visit with friends Carlos Perea, Amy Grunbeck, Claire Geiger, David Houston, and Jeffrey Baker.
Then, it was up over Galena Summit and on to Redfish Lake Lodge just south of Stanley.
The seasmoke made for fantastic shooting.
[ f/1.8 | 1/4000 | ISO 100 ]
|
_lo-res.jpg)
|
_lo-res.jpg)
|
September
More seasmoke, this time with Grand Mogul (we think) in the background.
[ f/7.1 | 1/100 | ISO 100 ]
|
September
Back closer to home.
Boston, to be specific.
The occasion? The
Mayor's Cup (ahem, bicycle race).
No bikes here, though, just a planter full of flowers echoing July's Biddeford Pool shot.
[ f/1.8 | 1/4000 | ISO 100 ]
|
|
|
October
Gloucester's as iconic a New England and perhaps even US cyclocross venue as there is.
One of its signature features is the giant rock that overlooks the course.
The rock's a fantastic vantage point for shooting cyclocross at a distance other than the
typical close-up range.
[ f/2.5 | 1/1600 | ISO 100 ]
|
November
Shedd Park's the site of my first ever cyclocross race back in
2012.
Shedd Park's known for its cinder track, its short steep pitches, and its hairpin descent.
Its back section seldom gets attention, but it sure photographs well.
[ f/4.5 | 1/100 | ISO 250 ]
|
|
|
December
Let's face it, I really can't stay all that far away from cycling.
Snowy Scrub Zone
was the second to last race of the 2016 cyclocross schedule.
After the race, I sliced trail on my surprisingly stable CX bike through 4-5 inches of new snow over to Harpoon Hill.
The Hill featured fire in a drum,
an unlimited supply of snow cold Harpoon (pictured, left), and a great
vantage point from which to heckle.
[ f/3.2 | 1/250 | ISO 100 ]
|
Broadly, 2016 may not go down as the most favorite of years.
But I don't have any personal complaints.
Betsy and I now share a home in Cambridge.
A new staff position with the
MIT Integrated Learning Initiative keeps me professionally engaged.
And from time to time, I find a bit of time to take some photographs ... and get out for a ride.
Happy New Year 2017!
|
